The Simpsons Stick ’ems are weird little rubber figures with suction cups on the back, released in September 2009 to celebrate the show’s 20th anniversary. They could apparently be used to play some half-assed Jacks-style game, but I doubt anybody ever did.

One was available each day for sixteen days with the purchase of an Overlord Murdoch – I mean, News Corp Australia – newspaper. That’s the Herald Sun in Victoria, The Courier-Mail in Queensland, etc. I’m not sure if they were ever available outside Australia.

Along with the basic set (pictured above), there were also rare, special edition versions of each: the six family members (including Grampa) came in a pseudo-gold variant, while the other ten had glow-in-the-dark versions. Those are pictured below, but I’m still missing a few of them.

The Simpsons Gift Collection, from Vivid Imaginations, is an exception to my rule of not displaying boxes. Why this? I don’t really know. I just found it still boxed, and it seemed like if I wanted to open it in the future I could, but I could never unopen it.

Weirdly, I’ve noticed that when this set is being sold online, it’s almost always still in the box. Why is this the one thing that absolutely everyone was reluctant to open?

Well, everyone except for the original owner of this extra, individual Krusty figure I have.

From Playmates Toys in 2001, this Krusty doll is straight out of the “Clown Without Pity” segment of the Halloween episode, “Treehouse of Horror III”. In the episode, Homer buys Bart a talking Krusty doll, who turns evil and tries to kill Homer when no one is watching.

It’s recreated quite well here, with a hard plastic head and plush body, pointed teeth, a Good/Evil switch and a pullstring in the back that says lines from the episode.

When the switch is set to Good, the doll says: “I’m Krusty the Klown, and I love you very much”, “Hey hey!”, “Here you go, buddy” and “Coming home to you makes it all worthwhile”.

But switch it to Evil, and it will say: “You sir, are an idiot”, “Come on, move it!”, “Shut your hole!” and “What have you done for me lately?”

As cool as it is, I was actually a little disappointed with this product. The “good” lines are straight out of the episode and are relevant, but the “evil” sayings are just mildly negative Krusty lines from whenever. It should say the things from the episode that spark Homer’s fear, ie “I’m Krusty the Klown and I don’t like you”, “I’m Krusty the Klown and I’m going to kill you!”

But then again, maybe it’s not a wise marketing decision to have a children’s doll threaten to kill them.